Ivy’s silent for a while, and she finally takes a deep breath. “Why not?”
I stare at my sister. “What do you mean?”
“Why isn’t sorry good enough?”
“Because it’s not, Ivy. There’s too much between us. We’ve only known each other a couple of months, and there are too many things stacked up against our relationship. If we break so easily, so early on, what hope do we have in the long run? I don’t want to prolong my pain. I just want to stand on my own two feet and give my child the stability it deserves.”
Ivy sighs, leaning her head against my shoulder. “That makes sense, I guess. It just seems like a shame to throw it all away.”
“I’m not throwing anything away,” I say, mostly to convince myself. “I don’t have anything to throw away to begin with. I’m trying to be a better person. What kind of person would I be if I just ran back into the arms of someone who basically threw me out when he found out who the father of my kid is?”
“You want me to ask him to leave?”
“Yes. No. Maybe.”
Ivy laughs, and I chuckle, shaking my head.
“I’ll go talk to him,” I say, pushing myself up to my feet. I help my sister up, and we both take a moment to catch our breath.
“I don’t think sitting on the floor will be a part of my life for the next few months,” Ivy says, grinning at me. “That was far too difficult.”
“Agreed.”
Ivy wraps her arm around my waist and leans her cheek against my shoulder. “It’ll work out,” she says. “It always does.”
Forcing a smile, I just nod. I don’t want to tell her that things always seem to work out for her. Me, on the other hand? Things only seem to fall apart.
With a sigh, I open my bedroom door and head downstairs to find Dante.
33
Dante
I don’t know what kind of welcome I was expecting, but it wasn’t that. When Ivy disappears to go chase after Margot, I wander to the back of the house and stare out the sliding glass doors to the backyard beyond.
A heavy hand lands on my shoulder, and Luca wraps me in a quick hug.
“Didn’t think I’d see you here.”
“It had to be done,” I say, forcing a smile.
Inside, I’m barely holding it together. The hope that flared inside me is slowly dying, taking my heart with it. If Margot doesn’t talk to me soon, I might suffocate from my own stress.
Luca lets out a deep sigh, walking away and leaving me to stare out the window by myself.
I’m not sure how much time goes by, but after a while, someone clears their throat behind me. I turn to see Margot standing at the entrance to the living room, looking as beautiful and as radiant as ever.
How did I ever turn my back on her? How did I ever make her feel like she wasn’t the one for me?
There’s no one else. Never has been, never will be.
I promised that I’d be by her side, and then I turned my back on her.
For what?
For my own pride. My own twisted past. My own prejudices.
“Margot,” I say.
“Hi.” She pads into the living room and sits down on a couch with a sigh, cupping her hands under her stomach.
I desperately want to run my hands over her bump. I want to lay a kiss on it, and talk to the baby inside. Because as stupid as I’ve been, I know in my heart that I want that baby to be mine. Even if it carries Beckett’s DNA, it’s always been my baby. Our baby.
Instead of sitting beside her, though, I take a seat on the armchair to her left. I lean my elbows on my knees, tenting my fingers and staring at the carpet.
“So, you’re here,” she starts. I can feel her eyes on me, but I’m too scared to look at her. If I meet her eye and I see nothing but pain, I know it’ll be over.
“I’m here,” I finally respond. With a sigh, I force myself to meet her gaze.
“Why?”
My heart thumps. Any speech that I imagined delivering flies out of my head, and all I can do is gulp past the lump in my throat.
“To apologize.”
“Okay.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Thank you.”
Our words bounce off each other, with barely a breath between them. Then, silence hangs heavy. I swallow again, struggling to find the words to tell her what I feel.